Image courtesy of imagerymajestic at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
It seems the idea of what is acceptable to Christian standards is quickly become that which is least offensive to anyone. You can do this – you might offend someone. You can’t do that – you might offend someone else. It seems that many people want us to live in virtual bubbles where we cannot even remotely do anything that might offend someone else.
And the justification for telling people to stop their offensive behavior? The ol’ “Stumbling Block Defense.” Oh, c’mon – you know that defense. It’s a variant of the “God-Card” – using your faith to shut someone down and to refuse to engage in dialogue. It’s His way or you’re wrong.
The Stumbling Block Defense goes something like this:
I don’t like what you’re doing. It offends my sensibilities & my understanding of what is appropriate for Christians. Your doing this is making me think things I don’t want. You’re making me stumble & the Bible says not to do that. Thus, you need to stop NOW and yield to my way.
You see how it progresses? The Bible passage the Defensive Coordinators use is 1 Corinthians 8:9-13, where the Apostle Paul talks about being careful not to let your own Christian liberty and freedom cause someone else (who doesn’t share your liberty) to sin.
A blogger and new dad that I follow ran into this issue on the subject of breastfeeding in public. (he’s a very talented cartoonist and uses his art to make poignant commentary on current issues, specifically connected to faith – you can find his post here).
So the argument in which he found himself someone asked about how Christians should respond if breastfeeding caused another Christian to “stumble” – shouldn’t the Christian cease and desist according to the Stumbling Block Defense?
No.
Let’s actually look at what the Apostle Paul said:
Be careful, however, that the exercise of your rights does not become a stumbling block to the weak. For if someone with a weak conscience sees you, with all your knowledge, eating in an idol’s temple, won’t that person be emboldened to eat what is sacrificed to idols? So this weak brother or sister, for whom Christ died, is destroyed by your knowledge. When you sin against them in this way and wound their weak conscience, you sin against Christ. Therefore, if what I eat causes my brother or sister to fall into sin, I will never eat meat again, so that I will not cause them to fall. (1 Corinthians 8:9-13)
Paul is dealing with Christians in a Pagan world in which meat was sacrificed to Pagan gods and then sold in the market. Some Christians considered consuming this meat to be sinful and idolatrous. Others had no problem with it. Paul is saying that, if those who have no problem continue to eat and invite those with issues to eat with them, those with issues might be eating against their conscience. THAT is what it means to cause someone to stumble – when your actions invite someone else to participate in behavior they consider to be sinful.
For example, if someone legitimately considers consuming alcohol to be sinful (it’s not, but let’s pretend for the sake of argument) and I throw a shindig and only serve alcoholic drinks and pressure this person to drink against his conscience, then I have caused him to stumble. Pretty crappy way to treat people, huh? It’s a total lack of respect for others. Paul says, “DON’T DO THAT!”
Paul never says that we have to kowtow to every whim of every Christian we run across. We will differ on what is or is not appropriate. It does not make it a sin issue to disagree. It is not a stumbling block issue to continue to do something others might find distasteful.
Back to the breastfeeding example for the blogger I mentioned: I don’t know anyone who says breastfeeding is a sin. Even if it were a sin, a woman breastfeeding will not cause me to start breastfeeding – I struggle with my boobs, but that’s a personal weight issue and I’m working on it 😉 It’s not a sin issue. Trying to get someone to conform to my idea of acceptable when it is not a sin issue is not cool. You see how using the Stumbling Block Defense is an inappropriate use of the Bible to manipulate behavior in others?
It is inappropriate for Christians to be throwing around the Stumbling Block Defense every time there is a disagreement about what is proper or improper, acceptable or unacceptable. It’s okay for Christians to disagree with each other. We can have different viewpoints and still be brothers and sisters.
What I would really like to see is for us to stop throwing God into the mix to get people to behave the way we want them to behave. When God speaks, we do. When God is silent, we need to allow for our fellow believers to act freely in their own conscience before God, whether we’re talking about public breastfeeding, alcohol, or even eating meat that has been sacrificed to idols.
Image courtesy of David Castillo Dominici at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Every once in a while someone does something so extraordinary that it shocks our senses and reminds of what humanity is supposed to look like. Today I read just such a story.
A man was in a restaurant when he overheard someone nearby receive a terrible phone call that shook her up. The man wrote a note to his server:
Do me a favor and bring me their check, too. Someone just got diagnosed. Don’t tell them
Wow.
What an example of a caring heart for others. The Apostle Paul once wrote:
Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers. (Galatians 6:9-10)
Too often we get so caught up in our own needs and wants that we completely neglect those around us. If we stop and think for a minute we might recognize that God’s grace is active all around us and that, no matter what we’re going through, God is present and is blessing us. Someone always has it worse than we do.
So keep your eyes open. Keep your ears open. Keep your heart open. How might you seize the opportunity to good towards others today? Tomorrow? Every day?
This is one of those conversations I wish we didn’t even need to be having. Yet here we are. I can’t believe the amount of hatred I’ve seen directed against President Obama. And yes, I’ve seen many accuse him of being the Antichrist.
But he’s not. In fact, the Bible barely makes mention of any single person being a mega-villain, end of the world, apocalyptic Antichrist. There is one paragraph in 2 Thessalonians that refers to the “man of lawlessness” but it is vague in typical apocalyptic style and is not even close to a description of President Obama.
For the most part, the supervillain antichrist is the stuff of Christian fiction (that means it’s made up out of a writer’s imagination as opposed to non-fiction which is literature that is true, like history, biography, science, etc.). It’s not even good Christian fiction at that. It gives us this image of Nicolae, a super-evil dude who is the epitome of all things evil who ushers in the end of the world and the eventual reign of Christ.
Fiction.
Not real.
The Bible does talk about antichrist, but probably not in the way you think:
Dear children, this is the last hour; and as you have heard that the antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come. Who is the liar? It is the man who denies that Jesus is the Christ. Such a man is the antichrist – he denies the Father and the Son. (1 John 2:18, 22)
John did not consider there to be a single cataclysmic figure, but established that many who oppose Christ are already in the world. Rather than a personal villain, John sees the antichrist as anyone who denies that Jesus is the Christ (Anointed One or Messiah). If that’s our criteria for antichrist then John was right – many antichrists have come. And I’m sure many more will come.
John continues:
Every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you have heard is coming and even now is already in the world. (1 John 4:3)
We don’t have to wait for the antichrist to come. It’s not some far-off distant event. John said nearly 2000 years ago that the spirit was already in the world. Stop waiting for that apocalyptic, Hollywood villain.
Now as to Mr. Obama specifically – he has publically declared that he is a Christian, a believer in Jesus. If he is not denying that Jesus is Christ then Mr. Obama cannot be the antichrist. It seems like pretty clear logic to me.
So what is our beef with Mr. Obama? It seems that we’ve taken our political animosity and clothed it in religious terms and ideas. We’re not happy with how he runs the government. We’re not content with his direction and vision for the future. So we take our political unrest and couch it in apocalyptic language. This is detrimental on several levels:
It does not allow for genuine political discourse. Any time someone uses the God-card it immediately shuts down conversation. I knew a guy one time who told me that God told him that he was supposed to leave our college and move to the northwest. What can you say to that? “No, God didn’t tell you that.” The God-card is a conversation ender. It’s used by angry, political Christians. Instead, let’s actually talk about ideas and policies. Let’s use our words to express why we are upset about the vision and direction of the government. Then let’s use our citizenship to affect change through our voting.
It perpetuates bad theology. The Bible never talks about a single antichrist villain. The idea that there is one big baddie who is the binary opposite to Jesus is bad theology. There is no power that is equal to God. The idea of polar opposites is dualism. It’s not Christian faith. Instead of looking for one person to usher in the end of the world, let’s focus on living kingdom lives here and now. Jesus preached, “Change your way of thinking, for the kingdom of heaven is here and now.”
It damages Christian credibility in this world. How can people take us seriously if we’re running off at the mouth putting spiritual villain labels on any politician we don’t like?
We have to take Mr. Obama at his word when he says that he is a Christian. Who are we to disagree? We don’t know his heart or his relationship with God. Stop using faith as a catapult for your political ammo.
Image courtesy of David Castillo Dominici at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
One of my favorite uses of Google is as a dictionary. I simply type: “define __________ ” and fill in the blank with whatever word I want defined. Today I typed: define integrity. This is what I got:
the quality of being honest and having strong moral principles; moral uprightness.
It’s about honesty. I would add that integrity means that quality of character that acts according to principles even when no one else is watching. Integrity is being consistent in our moral behavior. Just because I can get away with something does not mean that I should do it. Integrity says, “I know that I shouldn’t be doing this, so even though I could, I won’t.”
This week a lot of people had the opportunity to display integrity. Many failed. It seems that there was a system glitch that oversaw the EBT debit cards (food stamps) in Louisiana. For a brief time the cards had no limit—none. When people found out many flooded Wal-Mart and other supermarkets. Some people went to check out with multiple shopping carts filled to overflowing with groceries!
Let’s be honest – the people who took advantage of the glitch did nothing legally wrong. They were using the cards that had been given them. The glitch was not their doing (in a funny sidenote, Wal-Mart is blaming Xerox and Xerox turned around and is blaming Wal-Mart!).
While there was nothing illegal going on there was most certainly an issue of honesty and integrity. Just because a glitch allows you to do something doesn’t mean it’s the right thing to do. Every one of those people knew better. But when the restraints were removed there was no personal integrity to say, “Wow, what a funny glitch! I’m not gonna be a free-rider and take advantage of this.”
The Bible talks about integrity:
The Lord judges the peoples; judge me, O Lord, according to my righteousness and according to the integrity that is in me. 9 Oh, let the evil of the wicked come to an end, and may you establish the righteous—you who test the minds and hearts, O righteous God! (Psalm 7:7-9)
Better is a poor man who walks in his integrity than a rich man who is crooked in his ways. (Proverbs 28:6)
This post is not at all about poverty or social justice. I’m not opposed to the “haves” making sure that the “have nots” receive help. But this story does illustrate a human problem – when we think we can get away with something we will often do things we KNOW to be wrong.
Our issues may not be with food stamps. But we have other hidden issues that we wrestle with when we think no one is watching, when we feel like we can do it without consequence or repercussion.
Instead, let’s strive to be people of integrity. Let us live up to a quality of character that acts according to God’s principles even when no one else is watching.
Let’s be honest, many of us have hit the place in our lives where we feel like we’re just going through the motions when it comes to our faith. We’re doing the religious thing but we’re burned out. We may feel bitter towards God and the church. We may be angry. We may be tired. We feel empty.
We get this way because we’re trying to be religious under our own power. But the Christian life was never supposed to be about OUR power – it’s about HIS power. The Christian life is supposed to be charged by the Spirit of God.
When Jesus walked the earth he preached, “The kingdom of heaven is here.” Then he demonstrated that the kingdom had come through power. No, scratch that. He demonstrated that the kingdom had come through POWER. Even the Pharisees recognized it. Nicodemus told Jesus, “We know you’re from God because of the signs you do.”
The kingdom of God is lived out in power.
It’s supposed to set us apart from other groups. Without power the church might as well be the Elk’s Club, the Boy Scouts, or any other fraternal, do-gooder organization. That’s nice, but that’s not moving in the POWER God designed for the Church.
The Apostle Paul writes about God’s power for the Church:
A manifestation of the Spirit is given to each person to produce what is beneficial: to one is given a message of wisdom through the Spirit, to another, a message of knowledge by the same Spirit, to another, faith by the same Spirit, to another, gifts of healing by the one Spirit, to another, the performing of miracles, to another, prophecy, to another, distinguishing between spirits, to another, different kinds of languages, to another, interpretation of languages. (1 Corinthians 12:7-10)
A few paragraphs later he writes:
And God has placed these in the church: first apostles, second prophets, third teachers, nect, miracles, then gifts of healing, helping, managing, various kinds of languages. Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all do miracles? Do all have gifts of healing? Do all speak in languages? Do all interpret? (1 Corinthians 12:28-30)
His rhetorical questions demand the answer, “No – not all do these things.” But some do. God’s POWER ought to be evident in the Church. Why don’t we see people acting under His POWER? Probably because we’re fearful and we don’t seek it.
We’re afraid of the weirdo. We don’t want to be the weirdo. C’mon – who can watch Benny Hinn and not think that something is hinky with that guy?!?
So we throw out the baby with the bath water and say, “I’ll have none of that, thank you very much!” But just because some people go strange doesn’t mean there’s not some kernel of validity there. People have an ability to corrupt anything God makes. Just because some become prostitutes doesn’t mean we give up on the idea of sex. Just because some become addicts doesn’t mean we avoid getting medication from the doctor.
Just because some abuse God’s POWER doesn’t mean we stop pursuing it. Paul writes: “Desire the greater gifts” and “Desire spiritual gifts” (1 Corinthians 12:21 and 14:1). There is nothing in the Bible that EVER says that God stopped moving in POWER like He did in the 1st century. God hasn’t changed…perhaps we have. We’ve stopped pursuing Him and His POWER. Our enlightened culture doesn’t want the spiritual breaking through into our modern realities.
Remember that song from Snap in the 90s ~ I’ve Got the Power?
That needs to be the theme cry of the Christian Church. You see, we HAVE God’s POWER available. The question is, will we pursue his POWER and gifts are will we be content to be religious without any POWER to back up the faith? It’s like an unplugged lamp: it might look nice in my office but what good is it?
Image courtesy of David Castillo Dominici at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Once upon a time God tested Abraham and said to him, “Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” He said, “Take now your son, your only son, whom you love, Isaac, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I will tell you.” So Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey…. On the third day Abraham raised his eyes and saw the place from a distance. Abraham said to his young men, “Stay here with the donkey, and I and the lad will go over there; and we will worship and return to you.” Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son, and he took in his hand the fire and the knife.
Isaac spoke to Abraham his father and said, “My father!” And he said, “Here I am, my son.” And he said, “I see the fire and the wood, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?” Abraham said, “God will provide for Himself the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.” So the two of them walked on together. Then they came to the place of which God had told him; and Abraham built the altar there and arranged the wood, and bound his son Isaac and laid him on the altar, on top of the wood. Abraham stretched out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. But the angel of the LORD called to him from heaven and said, “Abraham, Abraham!” And he said, “Here I am.” He said, “Do not stretch out your hand against the lad, and do nothing to him; for now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your son, your only son, from Me.”
Then Abraham raised his eyes and looked, and saw behind him a ram caught in the thicket by his horns; and Abraham went and took the ram and offered him up for a burnt offering in the place of his son. Abraham called the name of that place The LORD Will Provide, as it is said to this day, “In the mount of the LORD it will be provided.” Then the angel of the LORD called to Abraham a second time from heaven, and said, ” By Myself I have sworn, declares the LORD, because you have done this thing and have not withheld your son, your only son, indeed I will greatly bless you, and I will greatly multiply your seed as the stars of the heavens and as the sand which is on the seashore….
What a story! It is fantastic and horrific at the same time. Fantastic to hear the unfolding of human faith and obedience and divine provision and promise; horrific to even think that God could make such a request of Abraham and to think that Abraham would even think about carrying it out! Many of the stories from the Bible have characters whom we should imitate; their faith, their actions, their motivations. Not this one! This isn’t a story you want to imitate. Even as bad as your kids may get from time to time you would never do anything like this to them. What if you thought God told you something but you weren’t actually hearing Him?
My wife and I are fans of American Idol. One time we saw a contestant who claimed that her voice was a gift from God and that the Holy Spirit told her that she should audition for the show, that God gave her a voice. When she stood in front of the judges she belted out the worst racket you have ever heard! It was so bad that Simon quipped, “Does He have a return policy?” We must be careful before we assign our behavior to God’s directive.
But we are told that Abraham received a directive. How could a good God, a God of justice, righteousness, and mercy, ask such a barbaric thing from a believer? What makes it even worse is that God seems to be breaking his own promise to Abraham. When Abraham hears from God for the 1st time (Genesis 12) God says:
Get up, leave your homeland and your family behind, and go to the place I show you. I will make your descendants into a great nation.
And now God is “contradicting this promise with a command to kill Isaac before Isaac even had a chance to beget any [children]. …God was not simply testing whether Abraham could love God above all else. The heart of the question was whether he could reconcile the contradiction of God’s word and continue to trust that God would remain faithful to keep his promise. “Not only was Abraham’s faithfulness on trial but so was God’s faithfulness.
But why is Abraham’s faithfulness on trial? Abraham never fully seems to connect with God’s promise. In fact, as Abraham and Sarah are passing through different countries, Abraham tells Sarah to pretend that she is his sister and not his wife so that other men will not kill him to take her. If Sarah had been taken by another man it would have thrown a major wrench in the machine! Fortunately God intervenes and Sarah ends up back with Abraham. Later on, as Abraham and Sarah are getting older, Sarah pushes Hagar on Abraham in order to produce an heir to the estate. Again, we see humans trying to force God’s promise to come to fruition. And what a mess Hagar and her son, Ishmael turned out to be! In fact, the whole life of Abraham could be called “How not to trust the promises of God.” And at every turn God says, “I have promised this – I will accomplish it. Why do you intervene? Why do you try by your own power?”
The sacrifice of Isaac almost seems to be God saying, “This is the last straw! Either you’re in or you’re out. What’s it gonna be?” And so God says, I want you to sacrifice your son. “What Abraham’s trial shows is that the world in which we live is full of spiritual trials behind which God hides himself.” Is Abraham “able to trust in the faithfulness and benevolence of God even when God appeared utterly untrustworthy and even antagonistic toward him.”
Have you ever been in a situation where God seems invisible? Or worse, have you been in a place where God seems to be against you? But is God ever really against you? Are you ever really cursed by God to suffer? Does it matter if you can’t see Him or what He has in mind?
And so God says, “Take your son….” You can almost hear Abraham involved in dialogue with God:
God: Take your son Abraham: I have two sons God: Your only one Abraham: This one is the only son to his mother and this one is the only son to his mother God: The one you love Abraham: I love them both God: Isaac!
However the conversation went, Abraham decides that he will listen to God’s direction at this point. And so the journey begins, towards a mountain in Moriah. For 3 days they’re on the road. 3 days Abraham has to wrestle with this decision. As they see the mountain in the distance, Abraham tells his servants to wait while he and Isaac worship God. Note the language that Abraham uses: “We will worship and return….” This has led some to believe that Abraham knew that God would not take Isaac. Or perhaps, even if Isaac did die, God could raise him back to life. But this most certainly cannot be what Abraham was thinking. If Abraham had full certainty that God would intervene then there is no real test, is there? Abraham would just be going through the motions – there is not real faith without the real fear that Abraham will never again see his son, never see Isaac grow, never see Isaac marry, never see grandchildren. No, Abraham thought that this was the end, and that’s what makes this story sickening – the fact that a cruel God would ask for such a sacrifice.
We see echoes of Calvary here in this story. The fathers have to sacrifice the sons, the only sons, the ones they love. Both sons are children of promise; Isaac the promise for future generations and Jesus the promise of salvation. Both sons know that they have a role to play in God’s plan. Jesus was no fool – he knew the call upon His life and knew how it had to play out. Thus He prayed, “Let this cup pass from me. Nevertheless, not my will but Yours.”
Similarly, Isaac is no fool. As they make their way up the mountain he asks Abraham, “I see the elements for the sacrifice, but where is the ram?” And Abraham, mustering what faith he could, can only reply, “God himself will provide the ram.” Yet the next thing you know, Isaac is bound hand and foot and is placed on the alter about to be killed. Think about this – Isaac is a young teenager. Abraham is over 100 years old. Is there anyway that Old Father Abe could have subdued, bound, and hoisted Isaac up onto the alter if Isaac was struggling? It appears that Isaac, like Christ, was a willing participant, knowing that following God’s call and will is the highest good.
Think about the feelings of abandonment and agony Jesus faced when he realized that this was the sacrifice God required. Have you ever felt abandoned by God? Have you ever felt that what He is doing isn’t what he should be doing for your best interest? This is what Jesus knew: the power and purpose of God were working through the evil and cruelty of the men who would kill of him. So many times we want God to take away the cruelty, to take away the hardship. Even Jesus wanted this. He prayed, “God, if it’s at all possible, let this pass me by!”
Would Isaac have felt any different as Abraham says, “This is what I need you to do?” When’s the last time you prayed for a difficulty or obstacle to be removed? Often we want all the difficulties and evil to be removed, but sometimes it is the difficulty that reveals God’s power and purpose. So Isaac ends up on the alter…. Sometimes it is necessary to make sacrifices in order to hold onto the promises and purposes to which God has originally called you.
As Abraham lifts the blade to strike the fatal blow, what’s going through his head? “God, you made a promise to me decades ago. We prayed for a child for so long, and just when you’ve given us what you promised, you’re making me sacrifice him!” And he lifts the blade and is stopped. God speaks and says, “Don’t strike. You’ve proved yourself.” And he looks up, and there in the brush is the ram. Abraham had told Isaac, maybe prophetically, maybe in hopeful desperation, “God himself will provide the ram,” and sure enough – there is the ram. In the end, Abraham rightfully decides that withholding from God is not something he can do.
Abraham’s act of obedience does not earn him the reward of the promise, but his wholehearted trust allows the promise to remain in God’s hands and so to be fulfilled by the only One who has the grace and power to bring about its fulfillment. Isaac may have lived if Abraham had disobeyed God, but the security of the promise would most certainly have been undermined. His choice not to try to control his son’s destiny, even while nearly slaying him, ensured Isaac’s place in the history of the promise.
Sometimes it seems that God is absent or even against us. The end result of the testing, of the sacrifice, is a deeper faith and a recommitment to the purpose and promise God 1st gave us. Our faith, like Abraham’s, requires that we let go of whatever we hold most precious, whatever we desire to control or protect, especially the gifts and promises of God.”
Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Would anyone deny that our country is in a bit of an economic mess? Just turn on the news or open a newspaper and one of the hot topics is the state of the economy. In the political world, you see accusation flying back and forth: the Democrats are to blame. The Republicans are to blame. This isn’t a partisan issue. This is a people issue because shutdown affects real people.
Everyone is concerned with the economy, even God. The word economy is even in the Bible! Many translations use the word manager or stewardship, but the literal words are economist and economy. When we are called to be good stewards or managers, God is calling us to be good economists. And since we are called to be good economists, and we KNOW God cares about what we’re going through, I think it’s safe to say that God is watching over this economic mess that America is in. And if God DOES care about you and the economy, we need to ask the questions: 1) How would Jesus respond to the economic crisis? and 2) How does Jesus view money and spending? Believe it or not, the Bible does address these two questions! How would Jesus respond to the current economic crisis? Jesus once told a story:
Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man’s life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions….” Then Jesus said to his disciples: “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; or about your body, what you will wear. Life is more than food, and the body more than clothes. Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds! Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? Since you cannot do this very little thing, why do you worry about the rest? “Consider how the lilies grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these.
If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today, and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, how much more will he clothe you, O you of little faith! And do not set your heart on what you will eat or drink; do not worry about it. For the pagan world runs after all such things, and your Father knows that you need them. But seek his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well. “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also. (Luke 12:15,22-34)
It’s almost as though Jesus is speaking to an audience in 21st century America instead of 1st century Israel! There is more to life than things, Jesus would tell us. So don’t worry about life. Don’t worry about food, or clothing, or drink. Worrying doesn’t accomplish anything. Jesus makes a difficult connection between worry and faith. It’s difficult because it is a natural tendency to worry when you’re not sure where your next paycheck is coming from. It’s a natural tendency to worry about paying your bills. It’s a natural tendency to worry about feeding your kids. And yet, Jesus says, “Who can change anything by worrying about it?” There are more important things in life than worrying about material things.
I don’t think Jesus is being naive. I think he understands the necessity of work, of pay, of food. Jesus was a skilled laborer who worked on construction and building projects around Capernaum. He’s not telling you to stop working. He’s not telling you to stop trying to earn a living. But what Jesus IS saying is that we don’t have our priorities straight. We too often get focused on the physical and material world and we forget that the things of this world have such a small significance in the big picture. I don’t think Jesus is being naïve. In ancient Israel, it was not uncommon to have feasting years and have famine years, times of plenty and times of scarcity. Our situation in this shutdown is not anything new to the world. Our own country has had it worse off than we are now. But we so often get caught up in the emotions of the moment. What am I going to do? We become economic chicken littles: “The sky is falling! The sky is falling!”
Hear the voice of Jesus: “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom.” There are far greater things to focus on, things with eternal significance. Stop worrying about the physical world, have faith that God can, and will provide for your needs. Instead of focusing on your physical needs, focus on how you can serve God and his kingdom. The rest, Jesus says, should be left in God’s capable hands. This doesn’t sound very practical, does it? Jesus sounds a little crazy for our tastes.
How would Jesus respond in this time of economic crisis? He wouldn’t worry about it and would focus on how he could serve the Father. As to the second question: How does Jesus view money and spending?
Jesus told his disciples: “There was a rich man whose manager was accused of wasting his possessions. So he called him in and asked him, ‘What is this I hear about you? Give an account of your management, because you cannot be manager any longer.’ “The manager said to himself, ‘What shall I do now? My master is taking away my job. I’m not strong enough to dig, and I’m ashamed to beg— I know what I’ll do so that, when I lose my job here, people will welcome me into their houses.’ “So he called in each one of his master’s debtors. He asked the first, ‘How much do you owe my master?’ ” ‘Eight hundred gallons of olive oil,’ he replied. “The manager told him, ‘Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it four hundred.’ “Then he asked the second, ‘And how much do you owe?’ ” ‘A thousand bushels of wheat,’ he replied. “He told him, ‘Take your bill and make it eight hundred.’ “The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly. For the people of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own kind than are the people of the light.
I tell you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings. “Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much. So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches? And if you have not been trustworthy with someone else’s property, who will give you property of your own? “No servant can serve two masters. Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and Money.” (Luke 16:1-14)
How does Jesus view money? Use worldly wealth to gain friends so that you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings. This parable is a little confusing, because the hero of Jesus’ story, the economist, seems to be shady! He was accused of being wasteful, so before he leaves his employment he calls his bosses debtors and tells them they can cancel the interest on their debts. There are several things to take into consideration here. First of all, the debtors do not know that the economist has been fired. For all they know, he still represents the boss man. The actions of the economist make the rich man seem very generous and benevolent. It’s as though the representative of your credit card company called you and said, “We’re only going to make you pay the principal, no more interest payments.” How would you react? You’d be jumping for joy!
When the rich man found out what his economist did he complimented his manager’s cleverness. The rich man won’t renege on the new deals because he doesn’t want to lose face. And now when the economist is out looking for another job, potential employers will remember him as the person who brought the good news about the reduction of their payment. The debtors see the economist very positively. When he leaves his employer, because of his actions he will be welcomed by other employers. The point Jesus is making is this: use your money in such a way that when you leave life you will be welcomed into eternity. That is to say, how you spend your money in this life can have consequences in the next life. Money may look to us like a simple thing for human economic interaction, but for Jesus its primary characteristic is its empire-building potential. Do you use your money to build your kingdom? Do you use your money to build God’s kingdom?
Jesus reminds us:
1. Money can fail~ The economist thought about money like most people do; bills, debts, etc. When his world is about to collapse, he is forced to think differently. Obviously it makes a real difference for our way of acting and thinking if we see money as a never ending safe domain or as a domain which at any moment may fail to offer us life and protection. Money comes and goes. What will you do with it when you have it?
2. Money has no part in real wealth~ There exist two worlds of economic living and acting. The “worldly wealth” Jesus talks about consists primarily of what you and others possess. But this virtual wealth is not equal to real wealth. While people of this world are inclined to look at their financial properties as real, and place faith and trust in God at the same time in the imaginary realm, Jesus turns these two around: it is the wealth of this world which is imaginary. Jesus tells us that wealth does not give life, just stuff. Are you concerned about wealth in this life or wealth in the next life?
3. Money can enslave ~ Usually the way we see money is that it serves us! In the words of Jesus, being a servant is inescapable. There is a service which sets you free and affirms you to serve God and your neighbor, and that service turns money into a little thing. Outside God’s kingdom, though, money sooner or later gets control over human lives and becomes a big power and set the rules. It gives its users the impression that they have the power of command or control, but the more they trust it, the easier they are deprived of their real freedom. For money has the inbuilt power to enslave.
Jesus does not condemn the role or use of money as such. He even recommends a specific kind of money-use, namely using money to build up God’s kingdom. But at the same time Jesus makes it crystal clear that money, because of its enormous potential to seduce people and nations, can also take the lead in the creation of an evil empire: the Kingdom of Money. It is a kingdom that functions as a kind of opposite to the Kingdom of God: in its view of life, of others, of wealth, of righteousness, of freedom, and of the reality of nature. You can never be a loyal citizen of both kingdoms. Jesus’ economic policy seems like madness in this market-driven world of ours.
Don’t stress about money and possessions, but have faith that God will provide for your needs. Don’t let money control you, because money and possessions aren’t important anyway. Instead, use your money to build up the kingdom of God. Use your money to serve other people. Jesus would not have been the most popular economic advisor. And in a country where one of our number one concerns in elections is who can take care of our country’s financial mess, Jesus probably wouldn’t have been elected president. But he’s not asking to be your president. He’s asking you to follow him and be his disciple. Can we make Jesus’ economic policy our own economic policy? Are you willing to trust God even when faced with economic difficulties?
Are you willing to use your money for God’s kingdom and other people rather than on stuff for yourself?
Image courtesy of stockimages at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
Some parts of the body are just more glamorous than others. There’s no way around it. The muscular parts or the sexual parts get a lot of attention and make us look twice, but who looks twice at an elbow or a big toe?
When it comes to our experience in Christianity the Apostle Paul compares our belonging to being part of a body. And, just like the human body, there are certain roles within an organization that get a lot of attention and the spotlight. Other roles are more like the elbow or the big toe – not a lot of glamorous attention given to them.
Sometimes not being the spotlight person causes us to sit back and do nothing. “I’m not the pastor, I just attend.” “I’m not a Children’s Church leader, I just show up for the donuts and coffee and to get my spiritual fix for the week.”
But that’s not the way it’s supposed to be.
You see – in the Church there are no bench warmers. Everyone is supposed to step up and play an active role in the ministry. It doesn’t matter if you’re the bicep who does the heavy lifting and looks great when flexed. You have your own role to play. Paul puts it this way:
4 Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; 5 and there are varieties of service, but the same Lord; 6 and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who empowers them all in everyone. 7 To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good. 8 For to one is given through the Spirit the utterance of wisdom, and to another the utterance of knowledge according to the same Spirit, 9 to another faith by the same Spirit, to another gifts of healing by the one Spirit, 10 to another the working of miracles, to another prophecy, to another the ability to distinguish between spirits, to another various kinds of tongues, to another the interpretation of tongues. 11 All these are empowered by one and the same Spirit, who apportions to each one individually as he wills.
12 For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. 13 For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit. 14 For the body does not consist of one member but of many. 15 If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. 16 And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. 17 If the whole body were an eye, where would be the sense of hearing? If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of smell? 18 But as it is, God arranged the members in the body, each one of them, as he chose. 19 If all were a single member, where would the body be? 20 As it is, there are many parts, yet one body. 21 The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” (1 Corinthians 12:4-21)
There it is. Everyone has a role to play – you don’t get out of serving just because you’re not such-and-such like you-know-who. It doesn’t matter what others can do. God calls us to use our gifts to serve.
In practice it comes down to the local church being made up of DOZENS of ministers, not just the pastor. God has called ALL Christians to do ministry. Many churches have taken an unbiblical perspective that the pastor is the one who should do the ministry of the church. The fact is, if people are expecting pastors to do the entire ministry of the church then the pastor will burn out and the people in the church will never live up to the gifts and callings that God has given them.
As a pastor it is my desire to help people discover how they can use the gifts that God has given them in order to be ministers. My church is launching a pastoral care & visitation ministry in the next few weeks. We’re training church members how to do visitation and provide pastoral care to others in the church. That’s AWESOME! That’s people stepping up to do ministry, to BE ministers.
Pastor Leroy Howe says it like this:
“We must stop using the word pastoral to refer only to the work of a congregation’s leader. Instead we must use it to refer to a particular kind of caring relationship and attitude, one that all Christians are called to cultivate toward others, with shepherding as its central image.”
So get off the sidelines and get into the game! What gifts has God given you? How can you serve Him and minister to others? There is an important place for you in the Kingdom of God that is not being filled as long as you’re warming the bench. Every part of the body needs to be functioning if we’re to have a fully healthy body.
How can you step up and minister to others for God’s sake?
I hate it when my friends make me think. It’s so much easier to hold to my ideas without ever having to think through them and see them from other perspectives. If you’re alive in America today you’ve probably been inundated with stories, articles, and opinions regarding the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare). I know I have been. But then a friend (who will remain anonymous – he LOVES it when I cite him anonymously) and I were involved in a group discussion in which someone said:
“Government control comes with a price that some do not want.”
To which my friend replied:
“What is this price you aren’t willing to pay? If we’re honest, this price most aren’t willing to pay is a smaller bank account. Most aren’t willing to make sacrifices for the benefit of people we don’t know.”
That’s what a lot of this comes down to, isn’t it? I’ve worked hard for what I’ve got and it’s already a struggle as it is. Now I’ve got to sacrifice more for people I don’t even know? I’ve got a mortgage. I’ve got kids in school. That’s how my mind went, anyway. I don’t want a smaller bank account. I’m trying to put into it, not withdraw from it!
But when do we actually start allowing out faith to influence our behavior? As Christians we claim that God loves people. We claim that we love God. We often forget to make the connection that loving God then means that we love people too, and that means caring for people who don’t have the ability to care for themselves.
James has a powerful passage in his letter in which he says:
“What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? If a brother or sister is poorly clothed and lacking in daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace, be warm and filled,’ without giving them the things needed for the body, what good is that? (James 2:14-16)
I’m sure men smarter than I am can argue about the exact significance of the Greek parsing and explain that this passage doesn’t really relate to the Affordable Care Act. As for me, I see a biblical principle at play: faith must be balanced out by caring for the practical needs of those we encounter. It does no good to wish people well if we’re not actually going to do anything about it.
Without actions to back it up faith is incomplete. We can recite the important elements of faith – love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind, and strength – but then miss the heart of God’s work; caring for people. Have you been in a place where you need help and someone has reached out to give you a hand? The way we want people to act towards us is the same way we ought to act towards them. Shouldn’t this come out in our social and political policies as well as our personal lives?
I believe that the Affordable Care Act is flawed legislation. The idea of forcing people to participate rubs me the wrong way – you cannot legislate hearts and attitudes. Still, I believe that the principle behind it is ultimately a biblical principle. Shouldn’t Christians be leading the charge to make sure that we are caring for people who need help? So what’s really behind our opposition to the ACA? Is it something about the legislation itself that we think could be done better?
Or is it bristling at being mandated to participate and the idea that our money will go to be helping someone else?
This government shutdown is some crazy stuff, huh? And much of it seems to be revolving around the Affordable Care Act (ACA), commonly referred to as Obamacare.
What I find interesting is that the act was already signed into law years ago. The fight now comes down to funding and rehashing arguments from years past. I’ve seen a lot of Christians who are really upset by this legislation. It has been criticized as drawing the United States into Socialism. And, honestly, I think there’s something to that argument.
I don’t know if I’d put a label on it but it seems like the left leans socialist. The idea of big government mandating what the citizens need to do for their own good seems socialist. Government regulation isn’t necessarily a bad thing – sometimes it takes THE MAN stepping in to see necessary changes and growth. It was good in when it came to women’s votes and desegregating the nation. In ethics – the government stepping in is good. In business, however, it’s a different game. More government regulation means less capitalistic freedom for citizens. It’s the government system or nothing.
Merriam-Webster says: Socialism is a way of organizing a society in which major industries are owned and controlled by the government rather than by individual people and companies….
I guess I focused in on the control element, but I would say that the ACA does tend towards socialism. Big Brother is taking away control from the companies to run themselves and imposing regulations. That’s not necessarily a bad thing – Jesus and the early Church had some similar leanings. In fact, early Christians seemed downright Communist! Luke tells us in his book of Acts:
And all who believed were together and had all things in common. And they were selling their possessions and belongings and distributing the proceeds to all, as any had need. (Acts 2:44-45)
Dang! Really? They practiced a distribution of wealth? Crazy, right? They clearly were not Republicans. But in a small setting where people knew each other and the distribution was VOLUNTARY, the system seems to work. They lived out the principles of 1 John 15-17:
Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world – the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride of life – is not from the Father but is from the world. And the world is passing away along with its desires, but whoever does the will of God abides forever.
But that was about the close-knit Christian community taking care of itself. You knew where the money was going and why it was going. Large-scale socialism simply says, “We’re taking what you have and giving it to someone else because it’s all ours anyway. You don’t really own it.”
But in order for socialism to work then all the sheep need to be sheered equally. The problem is that it never works out that way. Some of the fat sheep who run the flock always find a way to beat the system – to live through loopholes so that there becomes a dichotomy between those who lead the Socialist system and those who merely live in it.
I actually think it’s a good thing to make sure all people have access to health care. I think that Christians ought to be leading the way to ensure that people are cared for. The part that gets my knickers in a twist is fining people who want to opt out. Can you picture that at McDonald’s?
“Would you like fries with that order?”
“No thanks.”
“Okay – that will be five dollars for not giving you fries.”
“What?!?”
Someone told me that, while the ACA is not a perfect system, it is a flawed system taking steps in the right direction. Perhaps. I guess only time will tell as this thing gets resolved (maybe…hopefully…one day).
However it comes out, I urge Christians to behave decently. We don’t like to be told what to do. We rebel against authority we feel is out of line. And, if the government ever tells us to do things contrary to our spiritual convictions, I will be standing with you on the front line saying, “NO WAY!” But this isn’t the case here. It’s not a spiritual issue, it’s a governmental issue. Let’s back off the rhetoric and defamation of character and all of the other inappropriate behavior for followers of Jesus. It’s okay to disagree. It’s okay to seek to change legislation. However, too many Christians are led by their political passions and forget that their ultimate allegiance is to Jesus.
The Apostle Peter tells us:
Be subject for the Lords sake to every human institution, whether it be to the emperor as supreme, or to governors as sent by him to punish those who do evil and to praise those who do good. For this is the will of God, that by doing good you should put to silence the ignorance of foolish people. (1 Peter 2:13-15)
I don’t anticipate things will die down quietly. Most of us will hold to our positions without even considering an alternative. But, no matter what your political position, let us act like followers of the King of the Universe.
Sound off! Where do you stand on the ACA? Have you seen people behaving badly? Please keep comments and conversation civil….
Chris Linzey 